Street Findings

When we see a destitute man hunched over a shopping cart or a stained woman in rags with the top of shoes on callused feet, do we feel a sympathetic sense of indignation? Do we feel compassion? If they did have shoes, could we stand inside them?

It was 1983, I was waiting in a friend's car while she ran into a nearby shop. Something from across the street caught my eye. It was somehow off key relative to the music of the city. I studied the stirrings of newspapers and plastic bags. A cough of exhaust from passing bus unveiled a vague shape of a woman amongst the pandemonium of torn magazines, Styrofoam cups, McDonalds burger wrappers, grocery bags and various other urban droppings.

Nearby, stood a granny pull-cart filled with still more bags.

She was shaped by the debris of her city, She appeared to be organizing and reorganizing various discarded plastic bottles and aluminum soda cans with genteel precision of a collector of fine crystal. Every so often, she'd abruptly stop and take out shinny gold tube of blood-red lipstick and frantically circle and re-circle her worn lips; rebelliously crossing their chafed boundaries.

I felt a sudden rush of self-consciousness wash over me. Why was I so entranced by her every demented move? What did she represent?

She reorganized her bags once more. This time, putting them at the base of a nearby telephone poll. My mind saw her in slow motion against the bustling city. With the grace of a ballerina, she stood fully erect; chin tilted upward and ever so slightly arching her back. She lifted the tattered, crochet hat from her head. Her long white hair cascaded down ward around her shoulders; all except for a few maverick strands that flew up with the city's breath. She smiled contentedly and closed her eyes as we both inhaled deeply. I could no longer tell where she ended and I began. She was a Goddess, as lovely as any fair maiden …unassuming.

Meanwhile, people obliviously walked by this grand lady as they talked on cellular phones, puffed on cigarettes, pushed baby strollers, pulled on dog leashes never coming close to eye contact with this woman.

I had to see her eyes. Why? From my back opera seat of a '82 Honda Civic, I observed the perplexing mystery that emanated from this untamed shrew of Wilshire Blvd.

I watched myself open the car door. I got out and just stood as she arranged her precious cargo.

At one point, nothing else existed but her and I ….all sounds distant, movement suspended. I became numb to the city. Cars peripherally crossed my path as I jaywalked across the boulevard. I took a five-dollar from the rear pocket of my blue jeans and seated myself beside her on the bus bench. I was now participant instead of the voyeur. Somehow, I knew that words had no place. In tandem with my curiosity was the fear. If she were to look into my eyes what would she see?

I pantomimed as I took her hand and placed the bill very deliberately into it. She faced my direction. With the hand that received my offering she replaced it into the hand that offered it as if she had done it five times a day; everyday. I look at her face to show her my insistence, when I saw her eyes. They were cool, not cold but cool, like watery mirrored circles reflecting all my motivations back at me. She smiled as if to signify that she was in no need.

She was regal. She was also blind. Yet, her eyes were brilliant and revealing. She was not burdened with visions of the city; of this reality. She would forever be the young maiden running gleefully from castle to castle over the countryside carefully holding up the hem of her gown to make way for her ambitious bare feet.



With my own closed eyes, I could see her in the distance with a tall pointed hat; chiffon spilling from its tiptop. How I envied her.

Trapped In My Chrysalis - July 1996

I am at my soul's window behind the shaded curtains of cautious tribulation. I stay safely encased within my rotund frame protected against the eyes of men. I somehow traded sensuality for personality.
I figure if I can make them laugh than I am not dependent upon my body to impress. Thus, I have long since lost the battle to set my own standards of beauty and embrace my specific femaleness. I have let myself be measured by the likes and dislikes of Vogue magazines, commercials on television or the bodies of women twenty years my junior.

I was thin as a child and through young womanhood. I was a lifeguard for the very beaches I now avoid. Subconsciously, the origin of the weight is based in fear; fear of sexual expectation. Nothing could have prepared me for the startling irony I was to discover. My largeness has rendered me invisible. Within this invisibility I find great freedom. If a man is walking in my direction, I can look him full in the face without being afraid of him looking me in the eye, of him seeing me.

However, there are those warm balmy evenings when I want to be seen, admired....taken. I tell myself that my exaggerated curves are voluptuous and that Rembrandt would have admired every ominous arch of my body. But most times, I feel not as a woman but a caricature of a woman.
I admire those that have consistency of self-image as I try to unearth the Goddess that dwells inside me.

Child of a Narcissist

I am the child of a single parent who was a Narcissist. I didn’t always know she was a Narcissist. I didn’t always know there was anything wrong with the way she behaved. I didn’t always know that she was not like everyone else. However, something felt off kilter, but I didn’t know what it was.


My mother trained me to tell her that everything she did was right. And when I did not agree with her, I was a bad daughter who betrayed her and then used guilt to keep me in line. A thought of my own was forbidden. Yet, my mother took credit for all my accomplishments. The fact that I've had so few accomplishments as an adult might have something to do with that. Who knows? The low self esteem that plagued me throughout my lifetime has made it very challenging to be a good student, employee, girlfriend and especially a mother.

My mother projected the image of the perfect parent who happens to have an imperfect child. She covered herself efficiently. She used her charm to control how others perceived her. The rare times I would speak out against her, people did not believe me. That gutted any credibility I may have had within myself confirming I was bad....defective. So I retreated into silence.
I am the child of Narcissist. It’s not her fault she had me, it’s mine.

I created this in 2005 upon my mother’s death in effort to bring tears that were not there.

To the real, imperfect, beautiful world:

For me and people like me, give us love, we long for that, but not the kind which constricts, censors and burdens, the kind which acknowledges we exist, which frees us to express ourselves, and which encourages us to reveal what we keep hidden.

A Letter To My Younger Self:

You know how you feel now – so isolated and alone? Wishing someone/anyone would see you/hear you/recognize that you have value? That’s how it is, sweetie. You’re going to be feeling that for the rest of your life. Get used to it.

And you know how you’re always chasing boys around the playground? Writing their names on your notebook…sometimes making up a name, just so people will think you have a boyfriend? How the ones you like always let you know they have a crush on someone else? That’s pretty much the way it is.

And then, there’s school. You never manage to get your work done on time. Everyone thinks you’re smart, but you’re really just scraping by. Too bad. You’re going to take those lousy habits with you throughout your life and it’s really going to fuck you up. I don’t know what to tell you about that.

You think you’re kind of funny looking now? Well, you are. You won’t change much. You’ll never grow out of the “interesting” stage. No one is going to be coming after you for you looks, let’s put it that way.

And friends. You never managed to figure out how to make it into the “in” crowd, and you won’t. You think you feel isolated now? Just wait a few decades.The good news is that trade off will be gaining depth and independence.

So what can I tell you?

Don’t try to please anyone else. Just start putting away your pennies, and putting cream on your face now. You’re not going to like what happens when you don’t.

Don’t bother looking for love. It'll find you, you’ll be one of the lucky ones.

Enjoy what you’ve got now.

You'll look back fondly at your now.

BEING WONDER WOMAN: Not All It's Cracked Up To Be

I've always limited my exposure to mainstream fashion magazines or TV. I tend to be more interested in art films and music. But no matter how alternative the movie, any main female role was almost always skinny. Is a story is only worth hearing, are you a significant character if you’re not skinny?

I think that's all bull-poop. I know I'm worth more than my looks, yet people can compliment me on things I do like singing, crafts, writing but the thing that impacts me the most is the often said, "You have such a pretty face! When you lose that weight, you'll be so beautiful." So, theoretically, if I should suddenly have a “bikini body” then in this culture, I will most likely think  that my eyes are way too far apart, or that my chin is a little too floppy, until I need to start ranking my earlobe shape on a 1-10 scale. LOL!

I think a big reason many women shy away from calling themselves feminists is that they’re worried they won’t be able to live up to this idea of a Strong Woman, and that there’s no room in this club for anyone who isn’t 100% comfortable with herself all the time. You can totally be a feminist who has insecurities. Feminism isn’t about pretending we all feel like Wonder Woman, it’s about being honest when we don’t, and having the conversation on why that is.

Accustom To A Soul

Art by Tom Hussey

Written two years before my mother's death.


Is one's essence defined by the age of the body or their culture, economic status or gender? What are we without context time, gender and culture?

My mother has gone through a true metamorphosis and continues to do so. She wears different costumes of the mind. Each costume is unique and from a different time in her life; drawing upon different life experiences. Alzheimer's disease has sponsored my mother's time travel.
My mother was the provider of the family, thanklessly working two sometimes three jobs to make ends meet. Now her life has turned itself upon its head for she is completely dependent upon the family for her basic survival needs.

I am painfully aware of my mother's constantly changing context of time, emotion and libido. The self my mother is most ill at ease with, is within the glare of the here and now. Although I feel relieved each time she returns, it is a selfish relief for her face is filled with angst of awareness of her debilitating disease. The overwhelming grief she feels comes in thrusts. She experiences her life's memories slip away one by one, dissecting each factor of her being-forever irretrievable. She fruitlessly clings the echoes and shadows her memories leave behind.

I went to the mall to buy a birthday present for the daughter of a friend of mine that was turning four. I spotted a Raggedy Ann in the window of a toy store. I dodged and weaved my way through the toy store, bought it and slipped out. As I passed headless manikins, saleswomen spraying perfume in the air, my claustrophobia broke lose to the noise of a herd of giggling teenagers I saw marveling at each window display they passed.

Suddenly, I came up with what I thought was a brilliant idea. I would give my mother a make over. I quickly made my way to the nearest cosmetic counter and bought some make up, lotions, sprays and hair styling artillery all inspired by imagining my mother's joyful and excited expression. I saw myself as a skillful surgeon, about to rescue my mother's libido; the ego had landed.

When I arrived at my mother's door, I knocked for what seemed like fifteen minutes. I was always nervous about the possibility of confronting yet another unknown version of my mother. My favorite version of my mother is her at thirty-five. It was the tremendous power of nostalgia yet it was more. It made me a wide-eyed innocent eight-year-old once again. At thirty-five my mother is a real dynamo. She is a combination of Audrey Hepburn from "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and Elizabeth Taylor from "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?"; a powerhouse with elegance.
I remember when I was actually eight seeing her as possessing all the secrets of great womanhood..of life. Now at forty-three, I'm able to talk to my mother, frozen in time and realize that there are no secrets to her greatness; this is merely experiencing her "essence". My relationship with my mother is one that deals with the variables of our conscious mind and the psyches of one another set in a maze of time.

My mother finally cracked the door open just enough to peer outside. She squinted at me like a mole struggling to see within the sobering sunlight. Upon my entrance, my mother walked slowly back to the couch, stooped shouldered, head hanging in a quiet sadness and mumbling softly to herself. I watched her increasingly small frame as she sat down on the couch.  Her fragile body, meek and helpless, dwarfed by the portrait of her at twenty-two that hung on the wall behind her; mocking her. In the painting, she wore a stunning emerald green, floor length evening gown. It's Dracula-like collar stood high behind her neck. Her fresh ivory porcelain skin was set against the stark blackness of her hair. Now, she sat below her portrait, her gray skin looking washed out; blending into her dull gray lifeless hair. She wore a hair net with a few dangling bobby pins. Her pink terrycloth robe was showing bit from her breakfast that morning.

I opened the windows as I always did. I often would wonder whether I was trying to let fresh air and sunlight in or trying to let the dark, malodorous funk of depression out. I started to feel the musty darkness wrap around my throat. I sat down next to my mother and told her about my makeover idea. I spoke, carefully not to appear neither insulting nor condescending, I had to ask myself for whom would I be doing this deed? She tried to appear pleased with my idea, however I think she was just happy to have the company.

I started to remove the bobby pins from her hair. I asked her if she would also like to have her finger and toenails polished. She nodded. Like a zombie she stared at her feet that were nestled within two pink fuzzy slippers. I stood behind her and picked up the hand mirror and placed it in her hand. We both found our reflections. She turned away; eyes wild and frantic. I gently removed my mother's hair net and started to brush her hair. I kept flashing back to when I was a child and used to watch her skilled hand as she painstakingly and with expert precision, put rollers in her blue-black hair; every roller planned, every pin in place. But now my mother's hair reflected the absence of color from her life.

Suddenly, my mother bolted forward. She stood up and raced to the bags I had left by the door. Her body language had clued me in on a shift in psyche. Many who spend time with my mother mistakenly compare her to one who suffers from multiple personalities. My mother's "personalities" are all her, just at different times in her life...different ages; multiple contexts.
With her back to me, she sat down on the worn carpeted floor. She started to rock back and forth making a cooing sound. I rushed fearfully around to face her. She was cradling the Raggedy Ann doll with her eyes closed and smiling.

Suddenly, she opened up her eyes, frowned and looked at me, "MINE!" , she protested. "This is MY dolly!". She put it under her robe.

"Mom! Are you O.K.?", I said, already realizing the absurdity of the question. She slowly took out the doll and began to disrobe it, all the while keeping a very watchful eye on me. It finally sunk in that she was herself at about the age of five or so. I had not yet experienced her at this age. I didn't quite know how to deal with it. I smiled as I watched her as I had the ironic, memory of so badly I wanting her to be my playmate when I was a child.

"Do you like my dolly?", she asked me.

"Yes. I know you are a great mommy too!", I told her.

She giggled like a little imp. She took the brush from my hands and asked if she could brush my hair. She told me that "just yesterday" her mother had taught her how to braid hair.. I complied.

She brushed my hair as she had done millions of times before but this time singing little girl songs all the while. Although my mother is dependent and feels powerless most of the time, that afternoon, she taught me a lesson that no other mother would have the tools to teach; a lesson that transcended Alzheimer's disease; that transcended time. That afternoon I realized that I have a unique opportunity to connect with another person's essence  regardless of any specified context of mother/daughter. adult/child or decade in society. This exceeds the boundaries of the normal human-soul connection.

I felt that if I could be unselfish long enough to stop mourning my mother, that I would see that I was thinking too small. My mother will no longer be defined by the restraints of age. I was in awe of the fact that I could know my mother as a seventy year old woman confronting her own mortality in 2003, a thirty-something emerging feminist of the 1960's, an awkward adolescent who's naivete knows no bounds of the 1940's, or a bright-eyed child of five; pure and un-jaded by time of the 1930's. It's almost as if the powers that be struck a deal with my mother....she is only allowed to have a given memory if she surrenders to it with complete abandon.

----

Since I wrote that, it's been almost ten years since I time traveled with my mother. I had to let all of her go..

My mother taught me that there is one constant within the human experience: whether we call it a spirit or the soul, that there is a part of us that cannot be changed by time, age or circumstance.